Caffeine

Alright, this is new. I don’t didn’t drink that much caffeine, basically ever. I don’t drink coffee. I used to drink Brisk “Iced Tea” when up late in college, sometimes Mountain Dew (gag). Usually, I just slept a lot and did my work responsibly on time. Boring, I know.

Flash forward four-ish years, and I’m now working a job I actually care about. Problem is, I’m starting to get to the point in my tenure where my early waking-hour is starting to catch up with me. Gradually, my crack-of-dawn rise has slipped to the fissure-of-morning. Instead of quarter to six, I’ll crush my alarm until half-past. I don’t know if this is due to compounded lack of sleep over six months, or the slippage of the sunrise as winter quickly approaches. Regardless, I find myself more and more tired as the weeks push on.

Once through my slog of a commute (which has gotten so much worse now that school’s back in session), I’m either finally “awake,” or, on bad traffic days, pre-drained. However, at the office, coffee is plentiful. There’s an amply stocked rack of tea, and our floor just got a fancy new (and incredibly popular) espresso machine.

I don’t didn’t like tea. One day, I just started drinking it. Why? I thought maybe I’d like it more than coffee, perhaps. After all, the herbal tea I’d first tried was not only fragrant, but tasty! Except the novice in me didn’t realize it was caffeine-free. Oops. So, naturally I sprung for Earl Grey because of this guy. It smelled good too!

It tasted mainly like hot water. Hmm. At least it smelled good… Long story short, I got used to it, and now I drink (and perhaps even enjoy) caffeine, semi-regularly. Always black tea, and always as strong as possible. My job is starting to finally kick into gear, it seems, and I need to be alert and ready to tackle what I’m given.

Here’s the only major issue I have: while I’m not opposed to using substances to enhance my life in various ways (ie, alcohol at a social function, caffeine at work, ibuprofen when in pain, etc.), I am incredibly wary about using them regularly. I don’t even take ibuprofen unless I’m unbearably wounded. Perhaps most importantly, I’m not even convinced caffeine has an appreciable effect on me. In fact, the alertness my morning tea provides could simply be concurrent with my normal ramping-up for the day. There’s no reason why I would have a tolerance or, on the other end of the spectrum, an addiction. I have no idea. Perhaps a controlled study is in order.

So, now I start my day with a hot cup of Earl Grey, or Raspberry Royale, or Lemon Lift with honey, and somehow that makes me feel like more of an actual adult. Let’s see how long it takes before coffee is added to that list.